Chapter 22

The morning after a victory always brought with it a subtle atmosphere.

The emotion of joy was like a bird unable to fly for long, and it rarely survived the night.
The shouts that had shaken the ceiling of the parliament building until yesterday, the warm embraces of MPs hugging one another—all of it slipped back to where it belonged somewhere before dawn, leaving in its wake the unsettled problems to voice themselves in silence.

London’s newspaper stalls buzzed alone amidst this quiet. Extra editions with ink that had barely dried were printed throughout the night, and people eagerly snatched up the newspapers.

The one to deliver the news first was The Times, published on April 28, 1838.

[Triumph of Conscience! House of Commons Overwhelmingly Rejects War Budget with Qing China! (Ayes 171 : Noes 362)]

Devoting its entire front page, the article described the historic moments that unfolded in Parliament last night in an emotionally charged tone.

[…Young Conservative rising star William Gladstone wept as the voting results were announced, shouting, “This is the weight of conscience proving that our great nation is still alive and breathing!” At his impassioned cry, MPs who cast opposing votes crossed party lines to embrace one another and cheer. This vote will be recorded far beyond a mere rejection of a budget—it will go down as a magnificent declaration to the entire world that morality and honor were chosen over national interest…]

The article highlighted not only Gladstone’s heroic efforts, but also the courage of the noble ladies who led the Petticoat Petition and how the sincere testimonies of Kensington Palace housemaids Ann and Mary had swayed public opinion.

Having one’s name carved in print.

It was one of the oldest blessings an era could bestow upon a human being.

Once stamped in print, a name became something that, even if forgotten like words carved in stone, would never truly vanish.

Gathered in Mrs. Ashburton’s parlor, the noble ladies passed The Times around and blushed whenever their names were mentioned. Women whose names had never once been printed in the records of the world were, this morning, dipping their toes into that mysterious current for the very first time.

“Goodness, our names are printed in the newspaper!”

“Oh, Mrs. Stanley. Don’t you feel like we’ve truly accomplished something remarkable?”

The ladies could not hide their excitement. Just a short while ago, they were spending listless afternoons intoxicated by laudanum; now, they were praised as the protagonists who safeguarded the nation’s conscience. Everything felt like a dream.

Yet dreams are bound to be awakened from eventually, and they too had to wake up now. Even if they woke, however, they would never return to who they once were. Once someone has read their own name within the sentences of the world, they can never fully return to the self that existed before those sentences.

On the other hand, not every newspaper wore a festive mood. The Morning Chronicle, which had acted as a mouthpiece for Viscount Palmerston’s stance, expressed cynical concerns through an editorial.

[Can Conscience Fill One’s Pockets? - We Avoided War, But What Now?]

The tone of the editorial was calm.

It was neither anger nor resignation.

It was merely a rebuttal in the name of reality, brought forth by one who had lost the debate so that they might reclaim their place.

[…We respect the decision of the House of Commons. It is fine to indulge in the sentimental satisfaction of having protected a lofty conscience. Yet now we must face reality. What shall we do about our merchants chased out and stripped of their property by Qing officials, and how shall we resolve the trade deficit that is bound to snowball? Now that we have torn up our surest card—military pressure—do you truly imagine that the arrogant Eastern empire will willingly respond to dialogue with us? Sentimental self-satisfaction can never take the place of diplomacy…]

The Chronicle‘s observation was sharp. On this morning following the cheers that blocked war, somewhere in London’s sky hung the tangled threads of unresolved problems. Much like how one only realizes the true shape of the ground they ought to stand upon after sweeping away a sandcastle built through the night, perhaps victory itself was something akin to this.

“Your Majesty, I formally report the voting results of the [Finalization of Army and Navy Budgets for Conducting Hostilities Against Qing China Due to a Lack of Prudence Regarding the Opium Trade] tabled in the House yesterday.”

The following afternoon, Lord Melbourne’s face when he visited me looked as though he had aged ten years overnight.

A bluish pallor lingered beneath his hollow eyes, and the wrinkles at the corners of his mouth were etched deeper.

My heart ached, imagining how much agony he must have wrestled with all night long.

“Out of a total 533 votes cast, 171 were Ayes and 362 were Noes. Since the Noes exceeded a majority, the motion has been ultimately rejected.”

No emotion whatsoever was carried in his voice, and I merely nodded quietly.

“I see.”

At my calm reaction, Lord Melbourne raised his head as if bewildered. He seemed to have expected at least a reaction of surprise, joy, or relief.

Well, I already knew the outcome from reading the newspaper, and above all, I already understood that this victory was not a period, but merely another comma. Someone intoxicated by a single victory cannot walk the next step of victory. That was the bitterest lesson I had learned as a whistleblower back in the day—that the moment a verdict is read aloud is not an end, but yet another beginning.

“With Parliament’s decision, the military option against Qing China has vanished. However, the problem in Guangzhou remains entirely as it is. Merchants are still stranded in Macau, and trade remains suspended.”

“If not war, there is only one method left.”

I looked straight into his eyes.

“Shouldn’t we talk?”

“Talk, you say?”

At my words, skepticism flickered across Lord Melbourne’s face.

“Do you truly believe they will willingly respond to dialogue, Your Majesty? They do not even acknowledge us as equals. They merely treat us as barbarians who have come to offer tribute.”

“Which is precisely why dialogue is necessary. In a manner different from before.”

I rose from my seat and walked toward the window of the office. The Buckingham Palace gardens visible outside were peaceful, but my heart was preparing for an invisible war.

“Just as we dismissed them by calling them barbarians, they are merely viewing us in the exact same light. Without untangling this misunderstanding and distrust, a hundred years from now we will still have no choice but to point guns at each other.”

“…”

“War was merely the easiest option, not the right answer. From now on, shouldn’t we walk the difficult, painful, and tedious path?”

At my words, Lord Melbourne let out a long sigh. Within that sigh lingered the fatigue of someone lacking alternatives. He remained unconvinced, yet he knew at least the fact that he had to steer the country without being convinced. If one waited until complete certainty arrived, the world would have already departed down another path long before.

“Then… what specifically do you believe we must do?”

Turning back to look at him, I pulled out the final move I had contemplated from the moment I planned all of this.

“We must dispatch a special envoy.”

“A special envoy, you say?”

“Yes. A plenipotentiary envoy to convey our true intentions and discuss a new trading relationship on equal footing.”

There was no hesitation in my voice. The storm of war had barely been warded off, but now it was time to firmly pack down this post-rain soil. Our relationship with Qing China needed to be reset from its very foundations. And that beginning had to start with listening to each other’s voices.

At my resolute attitude, Lord Melbourne could no longer object, and merely nodded with a weary face.

“If such is Your Majesty’s will… I shall make preparations to dispatch an envoy.”

“Ah, there is something that remains to be done before that.”

“…Pardon?”

“Would you care to take a look at this, Lord Melbourne?”

I carefully picked up the metal plate resting upon my office desk and handed it to him.

“Is this… a drawing?”

“It is not a drawing; they call it a photograph.”

Seeming unable to immediately grasp my words, Lord Melbourne narrowed his brow slightly.

Perhaps it was a natural reaction. The word photograph had not yet firmly found its place within the language of this era.

He tilted the silver plate this way and that.

Depending on the angle of the light, the scenery upon the plate appeared and hid, hiding only to emerge once more.

It closely resembled the way memories rise to the surface of consciousness—evading capture even when one tried to look straight at them, yet revealing their form with vivid clarity only when the light struck from a certain angle.

And within the scenery that finally came into sharp focus before his eyes lay a certain port in the East.

A street where people wearing unfamiliar attire bustled to and from. And standing at its center were two European merchants.

They were pulling bottles from a box and handing them to the locals. And inside those bottles were…

“Th-this bottle is…!”

In an instant, Lord Melbourne’s eyes were dyed with astonishment, and his hands began to tremble faintly.

For stamped onto the glass bottles held by the merchants in the photograph, with unmistakable clarity, was the royal coat of arms of Britain.

“Captain Morris is selling off the royal name in Guangzhou. And in a thoroughly disgusting manner, at that.”

“Wh-where on earth did this photograph come from…?”

Unable to finish his sentence, Lord Melbourne could only move his lips in silence.

“French investigative journalists risked their lives to bring it back.”

I rose from my seat, approached him, and tapped my finger against the bottle in the photograph bearing the royal coat of arms.

“Dispatching an envoy is one thing, but make sure to hunt down the traitors, including Morris, without fail.”

Lord Melbourne stood frozen in place, still holding the silver plate.

Various scenarios were likely being drawn simultaneously inside his head.

The war proposal he had so ambitiously prepared had already come to nothing, and now he was in a situation where he had to send men across the sea to arrest a traitor of his own nation.

Even as a veteran politician, his body had grown too heavy to keep up with such a drastic shift of the tide.

After a long silence, he finally opened his mouth with hesitation.

“Um… Your Majesty, I beg your pardon, but….”

“Is there some sort of problem?”

“This matter of the rejected war budget… as you know, it means the cabinet’s core policy has been rejected by Parliament. This possesses essentially the same character as the passage of a vote of no confidence against the cabinet.”

Oh? Look at him trying to lay the groundwork.

Though his intent was glaringly obvious, I feigned ignorance, widened my eyes in innocence, and waited for his next words.

“According to custom… I must tender my resignation as Prime Minister to Your Majesty. So that a new cabinet may be formed….”

“Ah.”

When I let out a brief exclamation, a flicker of relief crossed his face. The inner thought of, ‘I can finally escape from this dreadful seat!’ was written all over his countenance, but what could be done?

I didn’t have the slightest intention of letting him go.

“I see. So tradition dictates as much?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. That is the long-standing tradition of parliamentary democracy, and—”

“However, is this not a time of national emergency? Has the royal family not been insulted?”

I cut him off gently.

“You saw that photograph just now as well. Even at this very hour, Morris is gnawing away at our royal family’s honor, yet would it not be far stranger for the Prime Minister to throw away his resignation letter citing mere custom and turn a blind eye?”

“Th-that is….”

Lord Melbourne’s face rapidly stiffened. The bewilderment of, ‘Wait? This isn’t how it’s supposed to go?’ was unmistakable.

“How long do you suppose it would take to elect a new Prime Minister, form a cabinet, and grasp this complicated issue all over again from scratch? By then, Morris will have destroyed all the evidence and fled.”

I tilted my head slightly toward him and spoke.

“Therefore, you shall simply have to suffer a bit longer. Maintain your position as Prime Minister at least until you have fully grasped the whole story of this Royal Grade Laudanum incident and seen it resolved. Is there anyone better suited to handle this than Lord Melbourne?”

Displaying a smile of boundless trust and encouragement directed at him, Lord Melbourne stammered, unable to either refuse or accept. I could almost hear the sound of several doors closing simultaneously within his mind. The door of custom, the door of tradition, and the door of retreat were closing one after another by my hand, and he seemed to realize he was growing trapped ever more deeply inside the labyrinth of this office.

Then his eyebrows twitched upward slightly—not an expression of surrender, nor of anger. It was an honest admission that he was being played with exquisite precision in the palm of a young queen’s hands. And mingling within that admission was something strangely akin to awe, resembling the quiet admiration of a worthy rival or someone who belatedly realizes that the match had already ended long ago.

After sending Lord Melbourne away, I finally breathed a sigh of relief.

Still, I’m glad.

The ugly Opium War that broke out in original history would no longer happen, and history would record this as an instance where Britain’s conscience and justice remained alive.

Of course, not everything was over.

Captain Morris was still selling the royal name in Guangzhou, opium was still flowing, and Qing China and Britain still misunderstood one another.

We had merely crossed a single hill; the road ahead was still long.

And chief among the urgent tasks was resolving the opium trade issue ethically.

“Resolving it ethically….”

If it were up to my desires, I would have gone myself, but with neither the situation nor the luxury for that, I needed to send a personal handwritten letter along with the special envoy delegation.

“Come to think of it, that won’t be enough.”

A personal letter was, after all, merely a scrap of paper, and if Qing China refused to accept it, we would find ourselves in an awkward spot.

If we failed to show sincerity toward resolving the crisis, the Opium War would erupt again sooner or later.

And sincerity was not something proven by letters. Sincerity could only be proven through action.

At that moment, the final question Lin Zexu had hurled at me through his letter came to mind.

“Does your country and its royal family truly possess even a single shred of conscience remaining?”

The answer to that question must not be mere words.

If I responded with the same mode of talk, he would dismiss it as Western wordplay yet again.

Therefore, wouldn’t it prove our sincerity if something tangible accompanied the message to resolve the crisis—something they could witness with their own eyes?

Just as we solved laudanum addiction for the noble ladies using tea infused with salicylic acid, what if we sent some of this over to Qing China?